


Reflection

by Illegible_Scribble



Category: The Lord of the Rings (Movies), The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: Baby Sam, Comfort, Family Fluff, Fluff, Frodo gets to stay in the Shire, M/M, Samfro Week, Samfro Week Autumn 2019, and be a dad
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-27
Updated: 2019-09-27
Packaged: 2020-10-29 03:48:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,410
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20790122
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Illegible_Scribble/pseuds/Illegible_Scribble
Summary: Sam was as small as Elanor, once.





	Reflection

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [Illegible_Scribble](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Illegible_Scribble/pseuds/Illegible_Scribble) in the [SeasonalSamfro_Autumn_2019](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/SeasonalSamfro_Autumn_2019) collection. 

> **Prompt:** Change
> 
> For Thursday, September 26th.

Frodo leaned against the door of the nursery, unable to help his smile as he looked at his husband.

Sam was sitting in the plush rocking chair in the middle of the cozy room, holding their little Elanor, as well as her bottle, which she had now nearly drained. Sam looked up from his gentle – but especially for a small and growing hobbit, absolutely necessary – work, and quirked a brow at Frodo. “Sommat the matter?”

“No, no. I was... I was only remembering.” Frodo came in and settled beside Sam, ruffling his hair and kissing his cheek as he did. Elanor looked up at him as she finished her bottle, and extended a tiny hand up towards him with an endearing coo. Frodo offered her one of his fingers, which she held with a surprisingly tight grip, and contented herself with holding it against her chest and subsequently staring up at her fathers curiously. Frodo brushed her hair, then, which was blonde, and much like Sam's, though a brighter gold.

It had been a surprise – the Tooks of course were often known for their fair hair, and Sam had come from a line where honey was as common as not, and yet Elanor's was an especially astounding shade of gold. Frodo wondered at times if it were part of the Elvish magic that had brought her about, some magic from Galadriel's box of earth (after all, a lot of blonde hobbits had been born recently, though Frodo and Sam agreed Elanor's hair was the most stunning of them all), or if it was just something intrinsic to her, special and from within. Frodo knew he would never know, and in the end he was content with that. Having Elanor at all was enough.

“She reminds me of you,” Frodo murmured eventually as Sam began to gently rock the chair, and Frodo lightly ran his thumb over Elanor's little knuckles, “quite a lot.”

“Aye, well, I think she's awful prettier n' me, now an' when I was her age, too.”

Frodo, admonishingly, but without too much force for Elanor's sake, smacked Sam's foot with his own. “Don't you start, Samwise. Particularly when either of us would know, it would be me.” Sam opened his mouth, “Your Gaffer might well be an even higher authority, yes, but even if he doesn't mean it, many of his words of you have been harsher than they ought to have been.” Sam closed his mouth, and Frodo rested his head on Sam's shoulder, briefly quiet. “I did know you when you were even smaller than this, actually. Just a little, I think.”

“Eh?” Sam rested his chin on Frodo's head, still gently rocking as he set the bottle aside, Elanor now finished with it and beginning to doze. “Ah, well, you did visit Mr. Bilbo at times afore he brought you over for good, didn't you?”

Frodo brushed his foot with Sam's again, still amused that Sam called Bilbo 'Mr.' after all these years, though they had been family in spirit for a long time, and now legally more recently as well. “I did, yes. Those trips were especially wonderful, after...” Frodo swallowed, “well, my parents. Bilbo was a wonderful rock, you know. Sometimes I don't know how he put up with me.”

“Lots of love, patience, and good hobbit-sense.”

“Mmhm.” Frodo snuggled closer, wrapping an arm around Sam in lieu of Sam being unable to do the same for him, for Elanor's sake. “Yes, he has a lot of that. I think that was why my parents liked him so much, and why we went to Westfarthing more often than other parts when they were still around. He was one of their favorite Baggins relatives, his eccentricies be damned; they were in great part why they liked him so much. … I think he was favored more by my mother, though, than my father; he was much more endeared to home, while she had a greater love for adventure and other improper things.” Both Sam and Frodo shared a chuckle over 'improper' and Elanor gurgled sleepily, as if trying to join them.

“I hadn't known. At least, not that much.”

“Yes, it's... it's been... well, rather a while.” Frodo nodded as he could at Elanor, smiling, perhaps a bit wistfully. “I... never expected, really, when I saw you all those years ago... that everything that's happened would happen. … You were so little, once.”

“Was I? Gaffer always said I was a big baby.”

A gentle rumble of a laugh stirred in Frodo's chest. “Oh, my mother said that as well. At least compared to me, anyway. Apparently I was little, but my mother said that about all babies, I think.”

“About me?”

“Mmhm. She held you – and my father too. We were visiting Bilbo at the end of April that year, and he was terribly proud. He's always held a fondness for your family, and he was happy a new addition had arrived, and a new little scamp would soon be pottering after his father in Bag End's garden.

“He invited all of you over for dinner that day. I don't remember everything, though my parents and I were each given the chance to hold you. Both of them found you immensely endearing, I think, and agreed your parents and Bilbo were rightfully proud of you.” Frodo paused to contain a laugh. “I'm afraid at the time I thought you much like any newly-born cousin at Brandy Hall; small and pink and crying a lot. … But you did have freckles, and big brown eyes, and honey-colored hair.”

“A lot like I am now, then?”

“Well, you've gotten rather bigger and much more handsome since then.” Frodo gently pressed against Sam for a moment, teasing him, before a thoughtful look came over him. “You did gurgle rather a bit when I held you – not fussing, but... trying to talk, as you could. And you reached up at me with your little hands, and not knowing what I ought to do, I let you hold onto one of mine- well, a finger, anyway. And you were content to hold it for quite a while.” Elanor was asleep, now, her own little hand still wrapped around Frodo's finger, though her grip had eased. “I got impatient eventually, though the smial was filled with coos and 'aww's at how attached to me you seemed. My father commended I was a natural with children, while my mother said you had good taste in friends.

“The Gaffer was in a small panic about it all, but Bell – who had gotten on very well with my mother – was just as pleased as everyone else, and Bilbo I think was almost sparkling with delight about it all.

“I did hand you back eventually, I admit as a lad getting bored rather quickly with a baby, and you started crying. It was only after several changes in arms and conversation, at the last from Bilbo to Bell, I think, that you finally stopped and drifted off to sleep.”

They sat quietly for what felt like was a long time, Sam having eased off on their rocking until they grew still. “I think afore, Mum or the Gaffer had mentioned they'd known your parents, an' maybe that I'd met 'em too, but... it weren't sommat I'd thought much on.”

Frodo pressed closer against Sam. “I am glad you got to meet them, even if it was only once. They liked you very much, and... and I think on the way home from the trip, they wondered if we might become friends, in time.”

“Ah, well. We done rather that an' more, I'd say.” Frodo raised his head, feeling the heat on Sam's cheek against one of his own, and placed a kiss to soothe away the warmth.

“Yes. And I'd like to think my parents would be happy with where we've ended up. Unconventional, perhaps, but... they always held me dear, and wished for my greatest happiness, and I can't imagine that anywhere else than here, with the two of you.”

Sam sniffled, and tears trickled from his eyes. “I'm awful glad- glad they did like me then, an' might've still, too. An' that I have you now, an' little Ellie.”

Frodo slipped his finger free of Elanor's relaxed hand, and brushed her hair, his own vision misting. “I love you both very much.”

“If I might say, on Ellie's behalf: we love you, too.”


End file.
